Films & Schedules
- GABRIELLE

GABRIELLE

DIRECTOR: Louise Archambault - CANADA

Gabrielle is a 22-year-old woman with Williams syndrome, a genetic disorder that often slows cognitive skills while increasing outgoingness and musical talent. She sings in a Montreal choir for other disabled adults, where she’s met and fallen in love with the dashingly handsome Martin. The bliss of first love is interrupted, however, by Martin’s interfering mother, who worries that special needs individuals aren’t sufficiently fit for romantic relationships, and by Gabrielle’s beloved sister, who is planning a move abroad to live with her fiancé. What emerges in Archambault’s warm film is a portrait of a young woman fighting for acceptance, freedom, and her right to experience life’s highs and lows as anyone else would—with joy, pain, confusion, and eventual understanding. This year’s Canadian submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. (104 mins.)